Comments

Comment by pieilike

Emalon isnt the same as archaveon he is much harder and isnt puggable. From my experience i would say Emalon = Naxx boss ill try to post strategy soon.

P.s i saw this in the achievment page some one wrote that his name backwards is "no lame" (this is true)

Comment by Aralis

There will be probably an extensive guide written - but something useful I have found

Debuff all the adds before he buffs one of them with the stacking buff (Overcharge). I cast Curse of Elements on all 4 while the tanks gained aggro at the start and they kept it on them the whole fight. When we killed one I just added it onto the next one that spawned. When he first casts Overcharge on one of the adds they gain full hit points but they don't lose their debuffs.

If you have a timer, throw short duration ones on all 4 (Like Faerie Fire or whatever) just before Overcharge happens. He will do it every 45 seconds.

Good luck!

Comment by HellShade

I downed this in 10 man with a PUG tonight. It wasn't hard after we got the basics down and removed some failure DPS.

Here's a quick guide on how to down this guy.

PreparationYou want to use buffs that will benefit DPS the most. HP is not an issue here. IE, Paladins should use Might over Kings.

Once you reach the boss, you'll notice that he is accompanied by 4 Tempest Minions.

The PullPulling this boss is basically the only thing the tanks have to do right for the entire fight. One way of pulling the boss is:

The OT runs in, pulling all 4 revenants and the boss

The OT uses all AoE skills available to generate threat on all 4 revenants

The MT taunts the boss off the OT. Paladins be sure to use Hand of Reckoning.

The OT brings the 4 revenants to the stairs

The MT brings the boss to the back of the room facing away from the stairs.

The raid moves between the revenants and the boss. Ranged stand as far away as possible from the boss. Same thing with healers.

You want to be at a good distance from the boss because he casts Lightning Nova every once in a while. Meelee have no choice but to go up there.

CombatThis boss is mainly a DPS test. Your DPS needs to be able to deal 200k in less than 20 seconds in 10 man in order to keep the raid alive. That averages out to be around 2.5k DPS per person. The combat sequence for this boss is:

Deal sustained DPS to the boss. Save cooldowns and burst spells

The Meelee DPS should move away from the boss when he starts casting Lightning Nova.

After 45 seconds, the boss will cast Overcharge on a revenant. All DPS MUST focus fire on the revenant before the overcharge buff on that revenant reaches 10 stacks. The revenant gains 1 stack every two seconds or so.

If the DPS is successful at downing the revenant, a new one will spawn. The OT must immediately pick it up before it starts attacking the raid. If the DPS is not successful, the revenant will explode for 30k damage killing pretty much the entire raid.

Repeat until Emalon falls.

Comment by Jinton

Shamelessly stolen from Iocrani's excellent post in the achievements section:

=========Emalon the Storm Watcher:

Emalon the Storm Watcher is a simple fight, with a moderately tight DPS requirement. He has no known enrage timer.

Overcharge is cast on a Tempest Minion, granting a buff that heals the target to full and causes the Tempest Minion to explode after 24 seconds. The buff that stacks on the Tempest minions will increase damage output by 20% every 2 seconds, maxing out at 240% before it explodes.

Lightning Nova has a 5 second cast time, and functions similarly to Loken's Lightning Nova. Damage recieved is reduced by distance from the boss.

Overcharge is cast on a Tempest Minion, granting a buff that heals the target to full and causes the Tempest Minion to explode after 24 seconds. The buff that stacks on the Tempest minions will increase damage output by 20% every 2 seconds, maxing out at 240% before it explodes.

Emalon also has 4 adds, called Tempest Minions:

Each add that is killed will respawn about 3-5 seconds after it is killed.

One tank should be able to handle all 4 adds.

Watch Emalon for Lightning Nova casts, and run away once he starts casting the spell.

Attack the overcharged Tempest Minion. This is critical - if the add is not dead within 24 seconds of the overcharge cast, you will be dead instead.

Have the offtank pick up the newly spawned replacement Tempest Minion.

Rinse and Repeat.

TL;DR:

If you have DPS below 2.5k sustained DPS, do not attempt this boss. You don't have the sustained output that you will need to kill the Tempest Minions in time. (2.5k DPS is assuming a 98% Time on Target and a standard group composition.)

Attack Boss - Kill overcharged minion - Repeat. An average group should be able to down the boss before the 5th overcharge.

Zong!

Comment by psionic

Couple tips on finding the Overcharged minions fast:

Press V to have health bars up. The Overcharged minion will jump to full health.

Mark each minion. Have a healer set their focus target to a specific mark. They should watch it and call out their symbol as soon as the debuff appears.

Comment by Ssateneth

This fight seems to be bugged. Chain lightning is 1 shotting 3 people at a time in 25 who are mostly T7 25 man geared, and 1 shotting at least 1 person in 10 man on a regular basis. If someone knows the gimmick to reduce damage, please let us know.

EDIT: Never mind. It seems key to spread apart.. I thought chain lightning did less damage each jump, but apparently the mechanic is reversed, doing more damage per jump. We'll have to try spreading out tomorrow.

Comment by TMWNN

I thought chain lightning did less damage each jump, but apparently the mechanic is reversed, doing more damage per jump.

Isn't this the way PvE non-player chain lightning has always worked?

Comment by PizzaMan

Everyone needs to go to the Suggestions Forum and tell them that Emalon needs to be put into his own instance.

As someone on the forums rightly pointed out, if you need gear from Archavon, you won't have the gear to kill Emalon and conversely, if you can do Emalon, you don't need the gear from Archavon.

I don't know about other servers but this do one/get saved to both has put a real damper on VoA pugs on mine.

Oh and just so this post isn't a 100% whine, do note that it is important to keep away from other players as much as possible when killing adds because Emalon can and will continue to cast Chain Lightning on players even if they're on the other side of the room.

On heroic mode, melee can stack in groups of not more than 2 or 3 and the Chain Lightning damage should be at a manageable level. Easily avoidable on normal mode unless you have a freak group that is half melee or something.

Comment by TMWNN

(The below was written before the 3.1.1a patch on 28 April 2009 reduced Emalon's adds' health by one third. On 25, the adds went from 741K to about 500K. On 10, what was 210K is now 140K. My 25-man group that had wiped for hours and hours since the boss' debut two weeks ago--with several agonizing single digit-percentage wipes--one-shotted the boss tonight. While I wish we'd have been able to kill the boss before the change, pickup 25-man groups now have a realistic shot at killing the boss, and I'll gladly take free T8 and T8.5 loot anytime.)

This is a fun, fun, fun fight, one of the best-tuned Blizzard has ever created. It had better be, because the fight has many moving parts. In terms of complexity and overall difficulty I'd easily put it on the level of Malygos (including phase 3), and above any Naxxramas fight except, maybe, Kel'thuzad. (You know the twenty seconds before and after the Lich King sends Kel'thuzad help in phase 3? This fight is sort of like those forty seconds looped over and over again in a room half the size.) Yes, it's definitely harder than Thaddius, Sapphiron, or Gluth; I'd put it slightly above Grobbulus, too.

After unsuccessfully attempting the boss from 3.1's arrival on with four different pickup groups on both 10 and 25, my first kill tonight was in a 10 group I led made up of people I knew could perform under pressure; definitely not your average pickup group. Most of us had seen the fight before, too. Thankfully, with the resurrection site now right outside the instance entrance, wipe recovery is 30 seconds flat. With all that going for us it still took us a full 90 minutes and two heartbreaking wipes with the boss under 5%!

What makes the fight so fun/complex is how its various elements directly conflict with each other:

Ranged DPS is preferable. On 10, at least, it's possible for a smart ranged DPS to find a nice spot away from everyone else and just hit whatever needs to be hit. There is no raid damage for ranged if positioned right.

Melee DPS is preferable. Well, certain kinds of melee, at least. If I have a choice of a lower-DPS ranged or a higher-DPS melee--especially a burst-capable DPS like a rogue, DPS warrior, or enhancement shaman--I'll take the melee every time. The boss has a big hitbox and a melee-heavy group can definitely succeed if everyone takes care.

This is not a DPS race. It is, 75% of the time, a survival fight. The boss does not have a ginormous number of hitpoints. DPS should save their long-cooldown attacks for the adds, and meanwhile focus on positioning (because of the Chain Lightning) and, if melee, running away from the Lightning Nova when cast.

This is a DPS race. DPS must understand that when the raid emote occurs they must drop whatever they're doing and shift to whichever add has the growth buff. This is the time to use every long-cooldown attack.

Threat matters at the start of the fight. The adds and the boss hit hard enough that tanks will need healing almost immediately, which risks an aggro pull. Ideally, a pull will go like this: a) Add tank rushes in and gets aggro on the adds and the boss. b) A rogue or hunter uses Fan of Knights and Tricks of the Trade/Volley and Misdirect to reinforce the aggro lead. c) The add tank's healer starts healing. d) The boss tank taunts Emalon and moves it to the designated spot. e) DPS only now start hitting the boss.

Threat does not matter after the initial pull. As a paladin tank I found that my normal threat rotation was damaging the adds too fast, risking an eventual "off-cycle" add spawn from Emalon. After the first 10 seconds of the fight I simply switched to autoattacking, Holy Shield, and Consecrate, while mentally preparing myself for the frenzied search to come for the buffed add. Once that add died, I looked for the newly-spawned add and taunted it. (Have the boss tank grab the new add first; then the add tank can grab it at his leisure, instead of it possibly rushing to a healer or DPS and killing him.) Hit-capped gear to eliminate taunt failures is highly advisable.

The strategy I favor is for the boss tank to pull Emalon to one of the two back niches (the green-colored ones visible from the top of the stairs, while the other tank pulls the adds to the middle of the room to minimize travel time for melee. When Emalon casts Lightning Nova, the tank and other melee should move to the other back niche, and wait for the boss to come to them (Remember what I said about it not being a DPS race?), meanwhile adjusting positioning to avoid Chain Lightning. Continue fighting until Lightning Nova occurs again, the move back to the first niche.

I don't recommend marking the adds ahead of time. Extra raid markers make it harder to pick out the right add out of the crowded group, especially when enemy healthbars are enabled. Instead, a) have the add tank quickly look through the adds to find and mark the buffed one, but b) it's also important that each DPS use his own eyes, find the add that's been healed to full health (that's why enabling enemy healthbars is important), and target it themselves. Every moment counts.

In closing, this is not a fight that groups will be able to anytime soon overpower with gear and without strategy. The combination of Chain Lightning and needing to quickly shift targets to one of four random choices means that Tier 9-geared pickup groups will repeatedly wipe. I'm glad I was able to finally beat Emalon, I'm glad I helped get two players what might be (given random numbers and the level of progression on the server) server-first T8 pieces, and I can't wait to fight the boss again. Thank you, Blizzard.

Comment by sushibar

Has anyone determined if grounding totems will stop the chain lightning?

Comment by Pirwzy

I've heard the rumor that the add with the lowest health gets the charge. Is this true, or is it truly just random?

Comment by Ganye

Just a note, AoE'ing the Adds down prior to the charge is useless: Overcharge instantly heals the mob on the first buff.

Comment by firespydere

ITS SUPER LOKEN O_o

Comment by Armethalieh

Is this guy from the new patch and wowhead just hasn't updated VoA yet because I checked VoA didnt show anything about Emalon. I cant check in game so I don't know. And if it really is on the page I have most likely gone insane due to having my gaming computar's hard drive brake and being unable to play wow for the past two or so weeks.

Comment by Gollgatha

We were having trouble finding the add with the debuff, so i would actually advise AEing the adds down just a little so its easier to find the one with the buff (because it goes to full health once the debuff becomes active)

Comment by Thepriest

screenshot any one? :)

Comment by earti

Emalon does have an enrage timer - about 6 minutes.

We ran into it when the latest DBM had a timer in which when the next overcharge was. This allowed the melee to break off early to get ready to mow down the enraged add. Altho we got the adds down faster this way, we did less damage to the boss because of this manner, giving us the enrage.

Usually it wasn't known due to the fact that groups would either kill the boss before it enraged or wipe on the enraged add. (this was on 25-man where you need more dps than 10)

(As a side note, I think the chain lightning is retarded. Melee heavy raid in 25 + chain when killing adds = instant death to all the unlucky melee. Woop.)

Comment by Nebrota

@nethrisidd on the whining thingy ;) people aint supposed too get tier 8.25 3 hrs after ding. (duh -.-)but i think the chain lightning part is challenging :D p.s. ( Wiped a few times, but still hasnt killed this bastard) :P

Comment by AKDarlor

Found a strategy that is melee-friendly and involves no chain lightning RNG. (25man)

Tank Emalon at a back corner, with the idea that you switch to the other back corner when he lightning novas. All melee have Emalon as focus target with cast bars enabled (through Blizzard's interface). Have the adds tanked right beside Emalon (in the direction of where you'll have to run). When Emalon starts casting nova, the tank(s) will drag them the rest of the way to the other corner; rinse repeat. This way the ranged stay more or less fixed the entire fight, and a chain between melee and ranged is never created.

For 25man, it is actually more convenient to have some melee so that the ranged have a bit more space (and hence more room for error).

Edit: It seems that the adds are now easier to burn and the chain lightning has a limit on its targets. As such the fight has become significantly easier, though the above strategy may be employed in a melee heavy raid if DPS is an issue.

Comment by qwolzor

10 man only:

If you end up with too many melee-classes or slacking dps but have strong healing I recommend the following strategy:

Off-tank switches to dps-specc and gear.Main-tank tanks everything.

1. Main-Tank charges in and establishes aggro on all mobs.2. Dps- and healing classes go into position3. Dps-classes target Boss and start attacking4. Damage Boss while waiting for Overcharge.5. After Overcharge target the only mob with 98-100% health.6. Kill it.7. Go to step 3.

Rinse & Repeat. Then loot.

A completely Naxx10 (no item from any 25 man raid) geared Pala had absolutely no problem with 1 holy-pala entirely on him while Restoshaman/Restodruid took care off raid healing.

Comment by sephyrine

AOEing the adds is wasted dps because you can see which add it is by 1) Seeing the "primal might" or "gnomish lightning generator" icon buff on the add, or that it's bigger.

Comment by crash19285

Note: It is confirmed for 25 man at least, there is a 6 minute hard enrage for the fight. We had him to 9% and he blew us all up for 100k a piece.

Comment by Stripfiguur

if the add is bigger than the others it means it already has a few stacks and for most groups it'll mean you're too late with DPS.by the time it's bigger you need to be already nuking him.

just Tab through the adds untill you see the buff as stated. in most cases this'll work.so far I've only had one attempt where I couldn't find him by pressing tab before it had grown larger. (in fact tab wouldn't select him even then and he blew up in my face :)

Comment by Deathjr666

Reins of the Grand Black War MammothDrop off him in 10 man.

Comment by Stripfiguur

it sucks that Blizzard has decided to add this boss to the same instance as Archavon in stead of giving him a personal corridor.

VoA was known for it's low threshold, giving emblems and gear to those that were unable (unable, NOT unwilling) to put great time & effort into gearing. (like me for example: I can do 1 big raid a week and that's time spent on my main char, but I want to gear alts as well)

now every time I try to get into a group for Archavon, the answer I get is "Emelon first, we don't want to get saved."what the hell? if you haven't managed Emelon by late Sunday evening, you probably wont kill him anyway..then after an hour of wiping we lose WG and all my alts get are 100g repair bills and no gear

thanks a lot Blizz, what's next? an epic boss in Scarlet Monastery, Deadmines or VH maybe so we can't gear alts there anymore?

Comment by Yamboo

killed him with 3 different chars in 10 and 25 and he always dropped gloves (pve) and belt (pvp)

Comment by sycocoaster

The hardest part about this fight is killing the enraged add fast enough.

According to data gathered here, you have 24 seconds after he enrages the add to kill it before it wipes the group, and the add will have all of its HP to boot.

On 10 man it will have 202k health.

Removing 3 seconds from the enrage (ample time for the dps to switch targets) and with a raid composition of 6 dps, that means you need 1.6k dps from each member. With 5 dps, that number jumps to 1.9k. Both calculations neglect the tank.

On 25 man it will have 741k health.

Same formula, with 18 dps (2 tanks and 5 healers) you need 1.9k dps from each member. Replace one dps and you need 2k from each member.

Now, let's take a VERY careless group, and run a calculation.

Say all 18 dps take an average of 8 seconds before they start to attack (it happens, melee start running late, ranged not switching until they're told, everyone fumbling around to target the correct add, etc.) This ups the requirement to 2.6k dps each. A pretty good increase, and the slower you get the worse it's going to be (obviously.)

That said, if you have a competent group where everyone can reliably do their job the dps requirement is not unbearable. What it's testing is your group's response time.

Comment by Rebmes

Comment by Shadowfriend

Mana Burn him. He stops casting Chain Lightning when he is out of mana. Assign one Mana Draining class (Warlock is probably the best) to keep his mana at ZERO through the entire fight, as Chain Lightning costs only about 100 mana.

edit to clarify:

The Warlock that is keeping his mana bottomed out is not DPSing at all, he should just be continually casting Drain Mana over and over. All the other mechanics of the fight still apply, Overcharged adds need to be killed and Lightning Nova needs to be avoided as best as possible.

edit: This is pretty much irrelevant in regards to the fight now, since Chain Lightning has a cap on how many targets it can hit. If people are dying to it, they are either severely undergeared or the healers are at fault (not topping people off after previous chains or Lightning Nova). Either way, draining Emalon's mana is no longer necessary.

Comment by Speeddymon

Will test tonight.

EDIT: Unable to test due to losing WG several times in a row.. Then maintenance. Planning to test tonight. Sorry about the delay.

Comment by brotos

Here is a tip for targeting the adds.

At first, mark the adds up. THEN, assign 4 people to set focus, one to each add (not the tank or healer).

When he casts the buff on one, whoever has set focus on that add will imediatly target and have the rest of your dps assist that person. (vent is a must for this strategy). It is also helpful to have the people who are on set focus to target a few seconds before the cast, just incase they call it out before they have it targeted.

When that persons add dies, they will need to reset focus on the new add.

We found this is best done with 1 tank 7 dps and two healers.

Comment by para11ax

Protip: Have everyone turn on npc health bars (press v). The charged add will jump to 100% health on its bar as soon as it gets a charge. Click the bar and start bursting. This avoids wasting time tabbing through adds.

Comment by Sounder

3: Your in for the Emalon kill with ppl of similar gear. Why would you NOT take the easy kill in the other room? Free offgear/Dualspecc gear and some cash.

In a PuG, that risks a bunch of people saying "thanks, I'm out, not up for a wipefest" after Archavon, and the raid then falling apart -- even though the group formed for a full clear. Happened to me 1st week of 3.1.

If you're forming for Emalon, do Emalon first. Sub-standard DPS can be replaced in the process. Afterwards, yes of course you go take the easy kill in the other room too.

Comment by sharkash

i wonder about a macro wich would be like/target (add name) (100%hp) or/target (addname) (buff)this would make this boss 50% easier. but soon i gues addons will come with auto marking and raidwarnings for all, making it even easier

Start the Pull with the Offtank(Add Tank) running in and grabbing aggro on all adds. Have a hunter Misdirect Emalon onto your MT.

Off tank holds all the adds in the starting location of the right 2 adds.

MT pulls Emalon to the middle left of room between pillars.

Raid Should try to space themselves out to be no closer than 10 yds between each other. With large amounts of melee you can stack 2 on top of each other. Main issue is the Chain lightning spreading too much if everyone is too close.

Melee should run out for when Emalon does his Lightning Nova ability. This ability causes everyone to take dmg. The closer you are to him the more dmg it does.

Emalon himself is not a hard fight, what wipes most raids are the adds. About every 40secs Emalon will charge an add. The add gains a charge about every 2secs until it reaches 10 charges, once it reaches 10 charges its a guaranteed raid wipe.

To be successful in killing the adds about 2-3 secs before he charges the adds have your melee start running to the adds to avoid losing precious seconds by transitioning afterwards.

As Emalon charges the add, the Add tank should be tabbing through the adds to find out which add has the charge and call it out in vent.

Everyone except MT should be burning down the named add. After add dies Dps should resume dps on Emalon until next charged add phase. As noted above additional charge phases are easier to pick out the charged add, because once the add is charged it gains full health.

Emalon will summon a new add to replace the dead one, this add needs to be taunted or misdirected to add tank, Add tank should remark new add with symbol of old add.

Rinse repeat, as long as you have enough dps to kill the adds, should not have an issue killing the boss overall.

GL, HF Enjoy the wipes learning the fight. 25manFirst time learning fight 8 wipesSecond time 3 wipes. (8 Melee DPS)10man First time a wipeSecond time 1-shot

Comment by AWZool

The OT can help finding the buffed ad by selecting him and marking him. DD-s should select the OT (set focus on him if you need to) and assist him as soon as the raid marker appears, so DD-s don't need to tab over the ads themselves

Comment by Stripfiguur

common sense would say an idea like that would work, but in-game experience says that it only takes one player to hijack the group and get you kicked..

people do crazy things when they get near a boss with T8 loot, like kill themselves for over an hour and deny they agreed on things. (things I can prove they promised by scrolling up a bit in my chat log :) )

Comment by uselessx

First time a wipeSecond time 1-shot

lol at nonsense

Comment by JackH

So, is it safe to assume that you need to pull at least 2k dps on 25 man to kill Emalon?

Comment by Icecoldcoke

Drops 2 emblems of conquest on heroic.

Comment by Fatnub

It would seem that this boss will not drop any pvp nor pve chests, instead he also drops pvp bracers, necks, and rings.Dont get your hopes up just like me :D

Comment by Blat4Ever

Haven't tried this boss yet, however it annoys me that people wants naxx geared guys.. And no I can't just go naxx because they only want people that already have naxx gear.. Sucks being me :(

Comment by Broloc

Get a guild that is willing to carry you then.

Comment by Manjo

I am told this boss is mana drainable, has a slow mana regen, and keeping him below 200 mana disables some of his abilities (The only one I can remember is chain lightning.)

Might help out pugs who can't jump through hoops. Can anyone confirm it though?

Comment by pallylock

I believe raid leader deadly boss mods will automatically mark the charged add with a skull.

I wish blizz had made another instance so I didn't get saved to archavon.

Comment by Benedict72

One notice: strange that no one mentioned he drops, IN NORMAL MODE, two Emblems of Valor.

Comment by AznNetwork

not sure if this is a viable macro to use, anyone care to try?

one tank sits out, focuses emalon, and spams taunt or w/e.

/cast taunt (etc).

the only time he looks at a tauntable object is when he does overcharge and this basically taunts the add away from the offtank so dps can see better which add was buffed. Plus offloads some pressure from the OT.

Comment by TMWNN

I believe raid leader deadly boss mods will automatically mark the charged add with a skull.

Bah. In my experience, DeadlyBossMods only puts the skull up on the charged add about half the time; the rest of the time, nothing. A buggy addon (and when is DBM not buggy?) is worse than no addon at all, because it can't be relied upon.

Comment by bluefurryfood

For the people saying he needs to be in a different instance, your dumb.

First off, if your going into VoA you can choose who you want to do. You don't have to do them in any order, so if your just there for emalon just go kill him and be done with it and the same deal with arch. There is absolutely no reason there needs to be another instance just for two bosses. Its like saying all the quarters in naxx need to be seperated.

Secondly, People still do search for raid groups just doing arch. I have seen at least 70% of the raid queues saying "just doing arch". If your server doesn't have that then search for a damn raid yourself instead of being lazy. If wintergrasp just won you can get a group together in like one min (decent usually too). Arch is still viable to raid people just expect since there is a tier 8 boss in it that arch suddenly got ridiculously hard too. Stop whining about the damn instance and do just arch if you really want too.

FYI - If a group is planning on doing emalon chances are they aren't thinking of a pug anyhow.

Comment by barbeque

This encounter has been designed such that the 25 version is substantially more difficult than the 10, and the quick enraging of the add makes it such that there is very, very little room for error. A well coordinated pug can easily clear 10m Emalon, but after 150g of repairs, from 25m pugs where the top 10 dps were all > 3k, I firmly believe that 25m Emalon pugs are futile.

Comment by RogueDaGreat

It IS PuGAble but only from people that got a fast brain and good gear/Rep. I will state the Req's just for anyone ;)

Tanks With Over 57%Avoidance and 29.5K HP Unbuffed

Mages/Locks on 3.2K DPS

Note: I did this on 6x4K DPS 7x3.3K and some 2.5K so u can outsands some bad DPS with some Really Good

Good luck on downing him we got him on 3rd :)

Comment by soopaloop

In a nutshell for 25:The short enrage timer means you need serious dps. Forget about ranged/melee argument, you just need people paying attention. I wouldn't attempt this with dps that can't sustain at least 3k output.

Comment by yangman

* The Emalon encounter has received the following changes: The total health of the Tempest Minions has been reduced and Emalon’s Chain Lightning spell will now have a limit on the number of targets it can hit.

how much the nerf is?

edit one :It took us 25 achievement earned persons to beat it,while the tank was full naxx 25gear.I am very interested in the nerfedit two:the hp of the trashes seems to be nerfed by 35%,well that's quite easy now

Comment by devildrlver

is the loot from emalon completely random?i downed him in voa 10and no tier droppedjust stupid crappy pvp shi1 ffs

Comment by Darlion

he was nerfed on 04/28, glad i was able to beat the old version ;)

The total health of the Tempest Minions has been reduced and Emalon’s Chain Lightning spell will now have a limit on the number of targets it can hit.

Comment by Halas

We pretty much used the same strat as Hellshade except we tanked Emalon to the left side of the room and the adds to the right.

You must get your add tank to mark the add with the de buff asap and have all your dps switch and burn the add.

Another add will re spawn usually by Emalon which we had a hunter MD back to the add tank.

This encounter has been considerably nerfed now and should be puggable by a half decent group.

As it was originally he could be downed by a guild who was geared for Ulduar content and considering he does drop tier gear I thought the level was appropriate.

Comment by linkhyrule

what exacully got nefted about this guy?

Comment by pantherka

he should be downable by a pug in hateful+ gear

Well, flame leviathan can also be done with a pug in hatefull+ gear. It doesnt mean whole instance should. Maybe Blizzard just changed their mind? Or maybe this is how they planned it to be.. It's the way for pve players to have a chance to get some pvp gear as well. If you have a problem with him, you should consider getting some naxx pugs for pve gear for you.

Comment by ttsaypra

This boss has an enrage timer on Heroic.After 6 minutes he will enrage and deal 500 % damage and will wipe the raid after a moment!

As a melee dps, its a great idea to move to the adds a few seconds before overcharge, since it will help bringing the add down ASAP!

Comment by Fabolous1990

Took him down today with PUG, wasn't hard once our MT stopped dc'ing, then it went very easy.

We had three tanks one to pick up new add to bring to other side.

At the end the Furious Glad Boots dropped which i won with a nice roll of 92 :)

Edit:Oh and btw the new DBM update now marks the enraged add as soon as leader tabs on to him.

Comment by Radol

I did it with 2 heals myself(paladin) and a shammy, and one warrior tank on ema and a dk tank on the adds. Easy caked the boss and the dps average about 2k+ with some like 2 people only over 3k. After we downed him we did arch in like 2 minutes.Emalon is a fun boss :D I do believe that having DBM marks the add that needs to be killed with a skull.

Comment by Citizenevil

There's mainly two reasons for wiping on this boss. 1) The enraging add isn't tagged and thereby not killed fast enough (the DPSs are attacking the wrong add if the right on isn't tagged; the tagging should be done by a healer or ranged DPS, since the OT won't see sh*t with those four large adds on him, in that cramped room). 2) Not enough time is given for the OT, that is to start the fight btw, to establish a high enough threat level, leaving usually the MT or a healer with one or more adds on them (have everyone count to 5 to themselves before getting into the fight, after the OT start the fight).

Comment by JoKo

Enrage is 6minutes and is 500% increased damage and 150% movement speed. Also immune to stuns or any snares.

Comment by critz19

Did this boss today and droped and it was ninja looted by the raid leader =/

Comment by critz19

Comment by enjoyspite

I use the DBM addon and it actually hurt me during our first few attempts because the timing of the warning is not quite in sync with the actual overload.

It's best to go by the in-game RW.

Comment by nosound

Latest version of Deadly Boss Mods marks the enraged add with skull, and indeed /rw about overcharge is given.Some tips to prevent your raid from whipe:Have enemy health bar shown on it's name plate. (Ctrl+V)Stay in range of adds to see instant when one of the adds goes full health.Much easyer like that.Have a hunter assigned to Misdirect the new-spawned add on OT, it will save raid from running-around-hitting-all-it-dislikes add.Having DK as MT is preferable as they have Anti-Magic Shell, helps to survive novas etc.Again, DBM users can type /range and set it to 10yards, spread out.We killed it as PuG: 2tanks (MTpala+OTdk), 5healers, 18dps mostly ranged.

Comment by Alma

In a PuG, that risks a bunch of people saying "thanks, I'm out, not up for a wipefest" after Archavon, and the raid then falling apart -- even though the group formed for a full clear. Happened to me 1st week of 3.1.

I understand, but I don't agree. The people who say "thanks, I'm out, not up for a wipefest" probably aren't geared for Emalon yet anyway. Doing Arch first lets them get better gear, and then you can replace them with better people when they leave, much as you would when the dps elimination rounds start happening after the upcoming Emalon wipes..

If you're geared for Emalon, you probably don't care much about what Arch drops anyway, so you have a win/win rather than a lose/win for the people geared for one, but not the other.

Comment by elladine

is there a way to macro target the overcharged add? someone was mentioning it in chat today but i didn't think the name changed enough for that to work.

Comment by BadMojo

As a warrior OT, I was concerned about picking up the adds off of the MT. However, it isn't that bad.

As long as you have Vigilance on the MT, just spam tab until you find the add with full health and mash Taunt repeatedly. Because of Vigilance, you should be able to grab him or at least taunt him enough times to get him over. The adds will stick to you due to your shield blocking.

As a warrior MT, once you pick up aggro, he'll stick right to you. As long as you don't spam thunderclaps and other aoe's, the add will be easily tauntable off you.

I did this in 10, not sure about 25.

Comment by Mantrhax

i did it today for the first time, and i think after the HP nerf its really easy to do.....no more a challenging fight.

Comment by sauron1984

He enraged on us tonight (25 man). Managed to get him with the last 3 people alive and all the dots ticking away. We were killing the adds in time but not him it seems - this is probably due to the nerf on the adds' hp. Now it seems that despite needing to have good enough dps to kill the adds, the fight now has an extra element of needing even more dps to get him before the enrage.

His enrage took about 5 mins, but I wasn't really counting.

Comment by w84me

Melee DPS is preferable. Well, certain kinds of melee, at least. If I have a choice of a lower-DPS ranged or a higher-DPS melee--especially a burst-capable DPS like a rogue, DPS warrior, or enhancement shaman--I'll take the melee every time. The boss has a big hitbox and a melee-heavy group can definitely succeed if everyone takes care.

Pala and blood DK has best brust dps inside meles anyway ench shammy can't even brust like %20 of palas brust also warrior can't brust like a rogue or pala because all their skills is about proc.

Rogue -> pala -> dk

Comment by Notnotadk

As a DK tank (yeah yeah I know) I found that we carry an advantage due to anti-magic shell absorbing a very large percentage of the nova. Using a DK MT on Emalon helps ease any stress on your healers healing raid/MT through the nova.

Comment by Dainhunter

reverse his name and you get "No lame" :)

Comment by Alaron

Just wanted to add a few notes/tips from a successful PUG clear of 25-man Emalon tonight as the OT (May 19th)

1) To start fight, add tank pulls and begins AoE threat rotation. Typically popping a short cooldown is wise on the pull. MT taunts boss off and moves him away. Rogues ToT'ing the OT and using FoK helps on the pull.2) Deadly Boss Mods (or Bigwigs) automatically marks the overcharged add with a skull, but it doesn't seem to work every time. Someone (preferably the OT) who knows how to tab-target/watch healthbars should make sure the mark goes up. 3) Emalon DOES have a 6 minute enrage timer in 25-man. This may not seem like a big deal, but with melee constantly moving for Nova/OC, it can be difficult if your raid is melee heavy. Try tanking the adds closer to Emalon. For Emalon himself, DPS should be over 2.5k (including target switching) ...replace people under 2k/people who die to Lightning Nova.4) A hunter should be designated to MD the respawned adds to the OT, if available.

Comment by Nafe

Although Wowhead provides a drop list, some people may wish to have a condensed list of drops, so they know which slots Emalon can drop loot for.

Comment by mixter

Comment by Valerina

Comment by Sallara

From the newest patch, Emalon is quite possible with PuGs. The minions have been easier to kill.

Comment by aliexo

Since 3.1.2 the adds now grow very big instantly, so targetting the right add is no more a problem.

and it seems if emalon himself got less armor.. (but im not sure of that)

Comment by Arondith

Does anyone have any idea what lvl Emalon is? I know most raid bosses are 83 but i'm hit-capped (8%) and still missed a few times.

Comment by ddett

This guy drops tier 8.25 legs and gloves, letting blue-geared pugs get best pre-hardmode epic gear fast and easy ;) Not many pug raids can kill Freya25 and Mimiron25 to get this gear "normal" raiding way ;)

So if you are not in good raiding guild, but want to get goot gear - you MUST kill emalon on hc and normal every week. Sooner or later you will get your gear.

Small advice - NEVER agree to kill Archavon(old boss) first. There is good chance that your raid is not good enough to kill Emalon, and after several wipes someone starts to whine, leave, raid will disband and you will find yourself saved and not able to kill Emalon this raiding week. Just leave raid group if they are going to kill Archavon first.

Comment by Amrun

Emalon the Storm Watcher

This boss can be hell for you raid group if you don't have follow certain guidelines. Especially on Heroic:

1) Make sure your DPS can hold their own. This is not a boss fight that you can have 2 players doing minimal dps while the others do average/above average. Unlike many other DPS race boss fights, the DPS race segment of this lasts 20 seconds. If you are on Heroic, I do not reccomend taking any DPS that can't do at LEAST 1.8k. This is, assuming that you have a few players who can do massive amounts (my raid had one 4.4k and a few 3.2-3.8k dealers. And we wiped because we had about 4 dps doing below 1.8k, one was doing 1k).

2) Make sure EVERY dps in your raid know s this. Pay attention now. When he overcharges, EVERY single DPS in the raid must target the overcharged add. You have 20 seconds to kill him. If you fail, your raid wipes. Save your cooldowns for the adds if you have to.

3) Try to make sure every member of your raid group has some sort of way of telling when he overcharges/novas. It'd be best if they all had an addon like Deadly Boss Mods, but if you can get a raid warning up somehow every time he is about to OC/nova, that works.

4) When he novas get away. Fast. Every DPS must run a very good distance away from Emalon when he starts to cast his nova, and the tank should probably stand a medium distance away (the further you are, the less damage you take. So the tank can take a little damage and grab aggro faster if your heals are ready).

Phase 1Have your main tank pull Emalon and tank him on the right (south) side of the room, while the offtank pulls the adds to the left (north) side. Give your tanks a few seconds (at least 5 would be good) to pull aggro before the DPSers enter.

He will lightning nova once, and you have to get away fast. If too many DPSers die on the nova, the next overcharge will kill you. He also uses chain lightning a couple time, but this isn't too bad, it can't even kill mages usually.

A small time after he novas, he will cast Overcharge.

Phase 2Find the overcharged add. They will be the only one with a buff (shows up on the bottom of the buff/debuff section under their health bar). Burn it down ASAP. You have approximately 20 seconds to kill the add, and it does more and more damage the longer it's alive. Once it hits 10 stacks of overcharge, it will do a massive AE which will kill pretty much everyone in the raid. Because it's base damage is 10,000 on avg, which is already enough to wipe out more than half of an HP bar off most DPSers. Add that to the 200% extra damage it gets for the 10 stacks of Overcharge and you get a grand total of 30,000 hits. Even if for some reason your tanks survived, your healers would not.

Long story short, kill that add.

Once the add is dead, rinse and repeat.

Comment by Poisonieer

I got my deadly Gloves off emalon today :P

Comment by aquasword

anyone else notice he uses the exact same model as the first boss of underbog? even has the same armpit smell/arm waving. just a different skin

Comment by destuctir

i thought i would say since no one has said it yet, but there is now a enrage timer on him, we puuged 25 man , did it 3rd try once we replaced some slaker dps but he killed him after he enraged, which was terifiying il let you know, 1 shoting the tank..

his enrage is the usual 500% increased damage ect

+ i would like to add, on 10 man its so easy

for thos who keep complaining about it being hard, we 8 maned it. 2 healers 2 tanks.. 4 dps.. easy as hell killing adds on about 8 stacks. we had 10 but 2 died straight away from pre agro.. 2 of the dps were on 2k dps.. i was the highest with 3.4k over all and at one points 4.2k dps on him

mind you we did have no mele dps at all, so might have affected the out come..

Comment by kelvin

Now with one of the updates,The minion that is charged will automatically increase it's size to be easily seen.

Comment by paladinmo

anybody else notice that he doesent drop the ret pvp gloves yet he drops all other classes/ specs

makes me want to QQ irl

Edit: on heroic mode

Comment by zakarthur

the next boss in VoA is name korolon the flame watcher (no lor(e) ok)

He will be added in 3.2

Comment by KTillyCharizard

Anyone else notice that Emalon drops more mage/hunter/warlock/rogue t8/8.5 gear than any of the other classes? I assume it's because if you're say a paladin, you'd have a chance at three types of t8, but when your a pure dps class, then you can only use one type. My mage likes this, but my shaman doesn't know how to feel about it.

Comment by Azerano

Rogue's can Feint or Cloak through the nova if you're having trouble with the dps.

Comment by Twis

I've (me resto druid, 2.1k heals) healed this encounter on both 10 (3 times) and 25-man (once). Last night I joined a 25-man pug and was asked to heal the MT on Emalon (feral druid). Ultimately I couldn't keep the druid alive, despite cranking out over 3k hps. It appeared that the druid had a leak as he was taking spike dmg totalling over 70% of his hp pool (~38k buffed). I haven't armoried them but I would guess that they were stacking stam and lacked avoidance. Regardless I was led to believe that it was my fault we wiped, not the fault of other healers, folks eating novas, etc. Should I be expected to be able to solo heal the MT in 25-man? This was very frustrating for me and I guess I just want somebody to be the voice of reason here. Thanks :)

Comment by tobindax

It's a bit of a lie that it doesn't hit hard the tank. I was geared for nax10 (full epic but mostly BOE, crafted and from heroics) and the hits weren't spectacularly easy to take. It would take me down to 40% health in 10 secs at most. Well, it didn't help that the healer wasn't imba but anyway.

Comment by Supahtoons

Comment by unreal25

"This is a fun, fun, fun fight, one of the best-tuned Blizzard has ever created. It had better be, because the fight has many moving parts. In terms of complexity and overall difficulty I'd easily put it on the level of Malygos (including phase 3), and above any Naxxramas fight except, maybe, Kel'thuzad."

"In closing, this is not a fight that groups will be able to anytime soon overpower with gear and without strategy. "

I don't know what's that fun about this fight... It is as easy as any current naxx boss. Best-tuned, what is there to tune? The TLDR strategy for this fight is: move out of the nova and nuke the overcharged add. You call this a strategy? ROFL. The fight can be done with anyone who isn't mentally retarded and awards Emblem of Conquest, PvP gear that usually requires arena rating (!), etc... As of this moment the boss requires what 2.5k dps which is attainable with hc+naxx10 level (ilevel 200) gear.

I don't know what have you been smoking mate... ^^ I guess this fight is made for scrubs like you who think move out of the nova and nuking an add is an example of very complex and interesting encounter. The difficulty of this fight is less than of Scarlet Monastery with level 40 gear. I mean seriously... you can fall asleep during this fight (and STILL do it successfully!).

Comment by ColdKiller

CANT wait for Aqualon the sea watcher

Sorry to disapoint you there, the next VoA boss is Koralon the Flame Watcher, and compared to Emalon he seems to be useless.

Useless as in if a pug can't beat him, then they need stop playing WoW.

He's a simple tank'n'spank with the only difference being that u gotta move out of the fire.

Note, you, techincally, only need 1 tank, although Meteor Fists will one-shot your tank if you only have one.

EDIT: Apparently his strength relies in his AoE damage, as if he does his spin-fire-spit ability just as you get hit by a fire, then you can easily be killed in 2 or 3 seconds if you get no heals, depending on how many stacks of his buff he has. (In my experience, at 8 stacks = 40% more damage i saw 5.5k damage taken, 5.5k damage taken, 5.5k damage taken, 5.5k damage taken, DEAD!)

Comment by Almar

If you're new to being level 80 or even a tank I recommend checking out my Vault 10man Emalon tanking video, to help give you an idea of how to tank him. In this video im on the adds, which It will give you a rough idea of how to tank the adds on this fight. To see the video follow the youtube link below:

Comment by svirve

As a rogue it's possible to keep DPS'ing during Lightning Nova.On heroic it hits for 30,000, if you use Feint a few seconds before he finishes casting it'll do a maximum of 15,000 damage.

Fully raid buffed it has ended up around ~10,000 to my experience, due to partial resists.Which is only slightly more than you would take if you ran away and didn't use feint.

Comment by McRaider

After the first 10 seconds of the fight I simply switched to autoattacking, Holy Shield, and Consecrate, while mentally preparing myself for the frenzied search to come for the buffed add...

...Hit-capped gear to eliminate taunt failures is highly advisable.

What I noticed was that the incoming threat from the rest of the raid is so low, that you can actually keep aggro with only holy shield up. When the one charges, I use HotR, AS and all the AoE tanking spells to deal damage and also to generate some additional threat to the others.

If my reconing misses, I'll either throw my shield in followed by exorcism and judgement... or just use righteous defence. Works just as well sometimes.

Comment by Killtyrant

In a Pug group you can almost always expect someone NOT to change targets despite numerous addon's and raid emotes and even pre-fight talk. So always bare in mind that you stand a relatively good chance to wipe at least once. That being said, I wanna throw this out there. Even if the add gets the 10 stacks its still plausible to continue the fight. The healers in Theory need to be pally's and some of the dps need some form of a shield as well. (mages, iceblock etc.).

as a last ditch effort to keep the raid alive, if it looks like the enraged is gonna blow you can pop ur shield. This can save a raid if Emalon is nearly dead or if enough DPS survived to be able to kill off another enraged. Just fruit for thought. At the very least this has saved me a repair bill haha(ice block -> invisibility (loss all agro))

Comment by mortedamos

Seems that Archavon tests tanking and threat exchange, Emalon tests DPS and positioning with other players, and Koralon tests healers and environment awareness.

Comment by ranger011

This fight is a basic Tank N Spank, but with a twist.

The Off Tank will charge one of the Tempest Minions, this is important because you want the off tank holding adds. Immediatley after, the main tank must charge Emalon, if this is done right, the Main tank will have Emalon's Aggro and the Off tank will have the aggro of the four Tempest Minions. The DPS must ignore the tempest minions for now.

After about 500k - 700k health, Emalon will cast Overcharge on a random Tempest Minion. The DPS must then all focus on the overcharged one (The one that becomes really big) you have about 10 seconds to kill him, if you don't he will explode and wipe most of the raid, leaving those who are still alive, with few health, little heals, and almost no DPS. So basically, if the Tempest Minion isnt killed fast, its a wipe.

Emalon will overcharge a Tempest Minion many times in the fight, after one is killed another will spawn.

Tempest Minions will also protect Emalon, i've never know exactly what this means because my main is a mage, so i'm never close enough to see what he does, but I beleive it means that he charges the main tank (whoever has Emalon's aggo) then goes back to the off tank.

Comment by silkfire

As a caster, I have noticed that if you stand in the center, you will never be hit by Lightning Nova. I think it's because the nova travels on consecutive ground, and the center pentagon is slightly sunken, thus omitted.

Comment by Zehitman

To all the people saying you should make the adds in different instances because I'm not good enough for this boss or that boss. I'm tired of this catering to the casual player, if they do put them in seperate instances there will be no earth,wind,and fire nor the future captain planet.

Comment by BahamutOmega

As a side note, not sure how this is calculated but my combat log shows Emalon gives 242 honor for being killed.

Archavon gives 161 honor and Koralon gives 322 Honor.

This was in 25m mode.

Comment by LatroVir

A hunter can obviate the need to ever switch to Aspect of the Viper in this fight. Just target his guards and toss a Viper Sting at one of them.

Comment by Frau

As of January 2010, this is still the most wiped on boss of the vault, at least on my server. For all dps, whether you are new or a longtime player, please do NOT pull this guy early, do not get impatient and say, "come on nubs just GO it's just Emalon we will pwn him". If you're pugging this and tanks/healers are not assigned, there is a good chance of a wipe simply because heals are not properly allocated or the tanks are not doing their jobs. Telling healers "just heal whoever is low" doesn't help because all the overhealing on a guy someone else is healing will empty someone out, and dps will start to die off. You can all do 10k dps but you aren't going to win if the tanks are dead. Give healers a 30 sec to decide who heals who. Thank you.

Comment by lopezrm

im raid to voa that voa will play it

Comment by alexiel

Killed him with 3 85s using a prot warrior, shadow priest and moonkin druid. A little bit of offhealing was required because the tank has 4 adds on him. Make sure to avoid Lightning Nova and kill the Tempest Minion who is overcharged.

Comment by Arbron

This looks potentially soloable as a prot warrior during this expansion. Vengeance goes through the roof due to incoming damage, giving you the DPS required to beat the enrage timer, and the adds provide Victory Rush which was enough to keep me going until Emalon enraged.

Problem? To actually get the adds down fast enough I had to switch to them often, leading to a DPS issue on the boss. Once gear becomes strong enough to let me ignore the adds, kill them with multi-target damage and VR when they die, and focus on the boss full time, I have no doubt this will be soloable.

Comment by cloud165

worth 16 honor at 85 with guild perks

Comment by kaikoraimi

Easily solo'd in ilvl 383 gear as an elemental shaman. I made sure to have an elemental down for each stomp--I used the fire elemental, then dropped the earth elemental when the fire elemental died.

Method:- Ignore adds, pop one of before the overcharged add explode.- Run away when Emalon is casting Lightning Nova.- Use WoG on cooldown (use it with wings when possible).

Was at 25% health when I killed him, still have bubble available to use.

Comment by wowogamer

Soloed this as feral druid in Bear Form and bear-spec. Pure dps gear except for a single stamina trinket. Itemlvl 385, and T12 2-set bonus (LFR gear) which gives extra uptime for Savage Defense. Used Runescroll of Fortitude II, Prismatic Elixir and foodbuff. 197k health.

Simple fight: Just nuke boss, don't do anything to the adds, run away when Boss do his Lightning Nova, pop Barkskin whenever its ready, and thats about it. Used Frenzied Regeneration + Survival Instinct in the last part of the fight when down to 90k hp, but I was never in any trouble. At the end of the fight I was more or less at full health. Whole fight took 4min 27sec.

Comment by Lilyi

I was able to solo this as an 85 atonement Discipline Priest.

I used this spec: http://www.wowhead.com/talent#bfMsMRsbcoroMuMZb:0qmdaq0zV and reforged all my gear to haste, then spirit. I used my i407 healing set (full BIS heroic Dragon Soul healing gear with the exception of Signet of Suturing and a heroic Conq helm token) and put on my Dragonwrath staff for this. You can likely accomplish this with less gear (normal DS, maybe raid finder level but probably not). There is no enrage, so if you can make it through 1-2 overload phases without hemorrhaging mana, you can kill it.

You never need to move for any reason, including lightning nova and overloaded adds.

Penance, then start spamming Greater Heal or Flash Heal (emergency only) anytime your atonement heals aren't keeping up (should mostly be during or to catch up from Overloaded add damage, but you may have to heal some outside that). Try to cast Penance directly after PW:S when possible to avoid lost ticks from pushback.

Alternate using Pain Suppression and PW:Barrier each time an Overloaded add reaches ~7 stacks and use Desperate Prayer if you fall behind at any point.

I killed him in 7 minion overloads. I had about 25% mana left and my shadowfiend was going to be up in 20 seconds when he died.

Guides

Related

Overview

Emalon is very much DPS test. He doesn't hit his tank hard, and his adds are not very hard to manage. He will use Chain Lightning on players away from him, and Lightning Nova on those nearby - simply spread out or run away.

Periodically Emalon will choose one of his four adds and charge it with a rapidly stacking Overcharge. The add will start growing quickly and increase damage by 20% per stack, as the number of stacks of Overcharge increases, and will explode when it reaches 10 stacks, killing everybody in range.

Tempest Minion - Emalon starts the fight with 4 of those adds around him. They attack with Shock, which inflicts 5,088 to 5,912 Nature damage. Every time a Tempest Minion dies, a new one spawns underneath Emalon.

Overcharged - Increases damage and size by 20% per application, stacking up to 10 times. A new stack is applied every ~2 seconds. If this buff reaches 10 stacks, the Tempest Minion will cast Overcharged Blast.

Overcharged Blast - Inflicts 9,250 to 10,750 Nature damage to the entire raid, increased by 200% due to the 10 stacks of Overcharged. The Tempest Minion dies casting this spell, and new one spawns ~4 seconds after.